Thank you to all who submitted abstracts for the 2004
NAASO Annual Meeting. NAASO received more than
930
abstracts at the deadline - that's a 33% increase over
last
year's submission!
Abstracts are now being reviewed. All corresponding
authors will be notified of abstract acceptance in mid-
August. Accepted abstracts will be printed in the
October Obesity Research Annual Meeting
Abstract Supplement.
Again, thank you to all authors, especially those
braving the traffic on the submission site during the
final day! NAASO is extremely pleased with your
support.

Online Registration Now Open
Make your plans to attend the NAASO Annual Scientific
Meeting, November 14 - 18, Las Vegas. NAASO
Members receive a substantial discount on
Annual Meeting Registration. Register by August
18 to
take advantage of early bird savings. Registration
includes admission to all oral and poster sessions,
symposia, debates, exhibits, opening reception,
refreshment breaks and conference materials.Not a
NAASO Member?
Now is a good time to join. Contact membership@naaso.
org or call the NAASO office at 301.563.6526.

Looking to Exhibit?
Exhibitor information is now online! View the floor plan
at Caesar's palace, and download the application,
contract and exhibitor prospectus. A list of current
exhibitors is also available. Join us in Las Vegas and
showcase your company's services and products to
qualified obesity professionals. Contact Tricia Cavallo
for more information and to reserve your booth space.

Corporate Sponsorship Opportunities
Put your company's name in front of more than 1,800
obesity experts!
A wide variety of sponsorship opportunities are
available. Your company can select an event, lecture,
workshop or symposia. For a more detailed list of
opportunities available, visit our
Sponsorship webpage or contact Margaret
Castillo.

NAASO GalaWhen registering for Annual
Meeting, don't forget to reserve your ticket to the
NAASO Gala, Tuesday, November 16th. Tickets are
$65 per person. It's never too early to start planning
your Gala attire. This year, come dressed in clothing
that represents your favorite decade of music. Are you
a 50's kind of person, or a groovy 60's dude? How
about a 70's disco queen? Punk, anyone?

NAASO Welcomes New Staff MembersAnn Marie Starzyk has just joined the Boston
Editorial Office as Editorial Assistant to Deborah
Moskowitz. Ann Marie, a long-time Boston resident,
comes to us after having worked for 20 years with the
Boston Red Sox, most recently as the Manager of
Special Writing Projects. She is a welcome addition to
our office.

The new voice on the phone at the NAASO Silver
Spring office belongs to Julie Strother,
Executive Assistant. Julie has extensive administrative
experience and was most recently employed by a
computer systems firm. Julie is in the process of
moving from Virginia to Maryland - to be closer to the
office of course. Welcome, Julie!

Membership Survey: Your input is needed
All NAASO Regular Members and Fellows were e-mailed
a
Member Survey last week. We encourage your survey
participation. Your responses will help direct our future
programs. Please mail your completed survey to
the NAASO office by July 31st.If you did not
recieve your Member Survey, please contact
education@naaso.org

Dr. Louis J. Aronne addresses North Carolina
Journalists
The North Carolina Association for Biomedical Research
(NCABR) conducts a series of forums for journalists to
provide sound scientific background information on a
variety of controversial research issues. In April, NCABR
and Research!America co-sponsored a media forum on
obesity research with NAASO's President-Elect, Dr.
Louis J. Aronne, as program moderator.
Dr. Aronne provided insight with his
presentation, "Obesity is Much More than a Lifestyle
Issue."

Regional Notes

EastKathleen Keller reports that Don
Schumacher, MD was appointed by the Lieutenant
Governor of North Carolina to a committee to advise
the State Legislature on issues of Childhood and
Adolescent Obesity.

Dr. Marie-Pierre St. Onge of the New York
Obesity Research Center, St. Luke's Roosevelt Hospital,
accepted a position as an Assistant Professor
at the University of Alabama beginning September 1st,
2004.

Earlier this year, Structure House, the residential
weight loss facility in
Durham, N.C., founded by NAASO member Dr.
Gerard
Musante, launched its
Diabetes Management Program. It is the first program
of its kind to provide
a multi-faceted, integrated approach based on
psychology to treat and
prevent diabetes. For more information visit the
Structure House Website

WestJudith Stern writes, "Thank you all for your
contributions to the July Notes. We would like to
include information from Alaska, Hawaii, Nevada, Utah,
and Washington in our August notes. Please help."

CaliforniaDr. Peter Havel's laboratory in the Department
of Nutrition, University of California, Davis received a
three-year Research Award from the American Diabetes
Association entitled: "Role of adiponectin in the onset
and progression of obesity-induced insulin resistance."
On June 25 in Washington D.C., Judith S. Stern
(University of California, Davis) received the USDA's
Secretary's Honor Award "for leading research in
nutrition and health, resulting in a better definition of
the factors underlying the development of obesity, and
new approaches to its prevention."

ColoradoRuth Lytle-Barnaby (Poudre Valley Hospital)
just completed a 12-week employee lifestyle challenge.
A total of 500 participants exercised over 1
million minutes and lost over 1600 pounds. The
challenge will be repeated in the fall. Paul
MacLean at the University of Colorado Health
Sciences Center and members of the
Center for Human Nutrition are studying why many
people are unsuccessful at keeping the weight off after
weight loss. They have developed a rodent model of
obesity with similarities to human obesity.
Some of this work will be published in an
upcoming issue of the
American Journal of Physiology. Sharon Miller
(smiller@beef.org), Director of Research for National
Cattleman's Beef Association in Centennial, CO shared
with us that the Cattlemen's Beef Board funds
nutrition research and
has set obesity and associated co-morbidities as a high
priority for 2005 funding. The call for proposals for 2005
funding will be posted on their website in early October.
Helen Seagle (Kaiser Permanente-Colorado
Weight Management Program) was appointed
Communications Chair (and newsletter editor) for the
recently formed Weight Management Dietetic Practice
Group. James Stevens, PhD candidate,
Research Assistant, Dept of Health and Exercise
Science, Colorado State University received the
Shrake Culler and Pashby Scholarship Award.
Congratulations James!

OregonJohn Purnell reports that The Oregon Health &
Science University (OHSU) has a new institute, The
Center for the Study of Weight Regulation and
Associated Disorders (http://www.ohsu.edu/weight/).
Its mission is to bring together investigators in obesity
and cachexia from the Oregon National Primate Center
(Michael Cowley and Richard Simerly), The
Vollum Institute (Malcolm Low, Wei Fan, and Roger
Cone), the Kaiser Center for Health Research
(Njeri Karanja), and OHSU (Jonathan Purnell,
Robert Steiner, and Daniel Marks).

Congratulations to
Wei Fan (OHSU's Vollum Institute) who just
recently got his first R01. Wei Fan good for you!

Canada Paul Boisvertreports from Canadian
Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) CIHR
and
the Institute of
Nutrition, Metabolism and Diabetes (INMD)
announced a third round of requests for applications
under its strategic initiative "Excellence, Innovation
and Advancement in the Study of Obesity and Healthy
Body Weight". Details on funding opportunities
under this strategic initiative are posted on the
CIHR
website.

The CIHR net program in Neurobiology of Obesity
regrouping Bill Colmers, Denis Richard, Alastair
Ferguson and Keith Sharkey will be organizing a
symposium on the
Neurobiology of Obesity at the Canadian Physiological
Society Annual meeting
February 3rd to 6th, 2005 in Quebec City at Le Mont
Ste-Anne ski resort . For more
information.

from the Universit=E9 LavalAngelo Tremblay and Paul Boisvert from the DB
Brown Research Chair on Obesity are organizing a mini-
symposium on Obesity and Food Behavior featuring
John Blundell, Albert Stunkard, France Bellisle,
Simone Lemieux and Vicky Drapeau at Universit=E9
Laval, Quebec City August 23 from 8 to noon.
Registrations are open to the scientific community. For
more informationMichel Cabanac recently released the book,
La Cinquieme Influence, ou la Dialectique du
plaisir 2003, Quebec: Presses de l'Universite Laval.
Cabanac's originality brings an intuitive understanding
into the field of science. The general conclusion is that
pleasure moves the human brain and pleasure is the
fifth influence of the universe. Because many
examples are drawn from body weight regulation, this
book should be of special interest to NAASO members
fluent in French.

From University of OttawaChris Blancard, =C9ric Doucet and Pascal Imbeault's
Canada Foundation for
Innovation & Ontarion Innovation Trust funding of
1,5M$ ($1.1M US) has recently
favored the establishment of a Research Centre for
Obesity Treatment and
Prevention at Montfort Hospital, Ontario, Canada.
For more information, please contact Pascal
Imbeault/ University of Ottawa, School of Human
Kinetics, (613) 562-5800 ext 4269.

In previous messages, I urged a more
thorough
investigation into the causes of obesity as part of a
call to action to stop the obesity epidemic. Without
knowledge of the cause, it is difficult to find the
solution. We do not know how to effectively treat
obesity! We need to encourage investigation into the
effective treatment of obesity and into the
development of new and effective drugs. This is not
happening with great speed. In a recent report the top
ten drug areas of research were reported to have
pipelines that included more than 1700 new drugs under
development (King, J., 2003, "Top 10 Areas of
Research: Fourth annual report on the most popular
fields of drug development," R & D Direction 9:28-54).
Over 600 were for the treatment of cancer and over
100 each were for the treatment of infections, arthritis,
cardiovascular disorders, respiratory problems and
psychological problems. None were for the treatment
of obesity. Fortunately, there are expectations that
research by pharmaceutical companies will yield new
drugs for the treatment of obesity. However, at
present few drugs have successfully completed phase
II trials.

In view of the enormity of the problem
of obesity, the
enormity of the failure to reverse this problem and the
billions of dollars spent to treat obesity ineffectively it
is critical to find solutions. Current treatments are
mainly things that are known to be beneficial in some
way and not to cause harm. This is very different from
having a real handle on the epidemic. There is no proof
that either current or proposed interventions will
reverse the obesity epidemic. The Center for Disease
Control supports several public health initiatives
including 20 State Nutrition and Physical Activity
Programs to prevent obesity and related chronic
diseases. Valuable data will derive from these and like
initiatives.